AMEC, the International Association for the Measurement and Evaluation of Communication, is inviting the support of public relations and communications organisations to join a global initiative to eradicate fully the use of Advertising Equivalency Value (AVE) and all of its derivatives as metrics in public relations work. Some practical steps which form part of a long-term industry education project:

Adopting a “Say No to AVEs” campaign logo.

Inviting all international trade associations to stop the use of AVEs in national PR Awards schemes. AMEC is asking its partners to use this wording in the Terms and Conditions of Entry in Award schemes and in briefing notes to judges.

Joining together through training programmes and events, to continue to push the message that by using AVEs it demeans the credibility of the PR consultancy or internal comms team involved.

AMEC has already made improvements to its free to use Integrated Evaluation Framework to make it an easier to use replacement for AVEs. “The Framework makes sense of the complexities of working across the PESO channels and shows how to shift the emphasis of evaluation from counting outputs to proving value via the critical outtakes, outcomes and organisational impact of our work” said Richard Bagnall, AMEC Chairman, highlighting the need to take decisive action to eradicate AVEs, which invalidity is shown by the global online educational resource centre.

The AMEC Framework, a free resource and hosted online at www.amecorg.com/amecframework, is interactive allowing users to be guided through the process while also saving their work as they go and is already available in 15 languages including Chinese. More info